RAMAYANATHE POISONOUS TREE

[Stories, Essays and Foot-Notes]

Telugu OriginalRANGANAYAKAMMA

English Translation

B. R. BapujiProfessor, Centre for Applied Linguistics & Translation Studies,

University of Hyderabad

R. Venkateswara RaoFormerly Lecturer in English, Andhra Pradesh

Ari SitaramayyaProfessor, Biomedical Sciences, Oakland University, USA

C. PadmajaAssociate Professor, Department of Journalism & Communication,

Osmania University

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Ramayana, the Poisonous Tree[Stories, Essays and Foot-notes]By Ranganayakamma

Copy Right: Ranganayakamma

First Published: August, 2004

ISBN: 81-87515-06-6

Published by:Ranganayakamma,76, Lake-side Colony,Jubilee Hills post,HYDERABAD- 500 033.Andhra Pradesh, INDIA.Phone: 040-2311 7302.Email: brbapuji@yahoo.com

Title pictures:TRIGUN

Page make-up:N.Raghuramayya

Printed at:Charita Graphics,1-16-79/3, Alwal,Secunderabad- 500 015.

Note on Copy Right:Though there should not be copy right for any book in which people aregenuinely interested, the writer has mentioned this not for commercialpurposes but for certain technical reasons only. *

Pages: 784

Price: Rs.150 $. 30

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CONTENTS[This volume is in 4 parts]

Part 1 PREFACE 9

The Story of Rama 10The Actual Purpose of this Preface 24 Once Again on Ramayana 77

Part 2‘THE POISONOUS TREE’ 91

[This part consists of: A prelude, 16 stories,11 links, 4 essays and 504 Foot-notes.]

PRELUDE: Beginning of Bala kanda in Valmiki ‘Ramayana’ 91

1. This is Ramayana! ................................ (story-1) ....... 982. Link-1 Betweeen the 1st Story and the 2nd Story ................... 1173. A Throne at the Mercy of the Sandals . (story-2) ..... 1284. Link-2 ........................................................................... 2475. This is How it Happened! .................... (story-3) ..... 2616. Link-3 .......................................................................... 2757. Greater Guy than the Other! .............. (story-4) ..... 2798. Link-4 .......................................................................... 2919. Did She Heed? ....................................... (story-5) ..... 297

10. Link-5 .......................................................................... 31711. The Sex Pundit ...................................... (story-6) ..... 32412. The Accomplices (Rama and Sugriva) (story-7) ..... 33513. The True Colours of the Friendship .... (story-8) ..... 38014. Link-6 .......................................................................... 40615. Sita and Ravana.................................... (story-9) .... 424

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16. Link-7 ......................................................................... 44617. The Gift that didn't Cost a Penny! ..... (story-10) ... 45818. How Great I am! How many hardships I face! ................. (story-11) ... 47919. The Third Thief

(Vibhishana) .......................................... .(story-12) .. 49520. Link-8 .......................................................................... 51621. Has Rama Passed Away? ..................... (story-13) ... 52322. Link-9 .......................................................................... 53123. The Public Trial .................................... (story-14) ... 59024. Link-10 ........................................................................ 60625. Rama in the place of Sandals ............... (story-15) ... 60926. Link-11 ........................................................................ 62927. The Beauty of Rama’s Rajya ............... (story-16) ... 64328. What are the bebefits of reading

or listening to Ramayana? ....................... (essay) ........ 67429. Valmiki as a Poet .................................... (essay) ........ 67730. Gods and Devotion .................................. (essay) ........ 68931. Why should we reject the culture of theRamayana? .................... (essay) ........ 692

Part 3 SOME CRITICS OF RAMAYANA 694

[This part has 8 critics]

1. Narla Venkateswara Rao's 'Jabali' .......................................... 6942. Kodavatiganti Kutumba Rao’s 'Another Ramayana' .............. 7113. Kotta Satyanarayana Chowdary’s ‘Secrets of Ramayana’ ..... 7214. Suravaram Pratapa Reddy’s ‘ Specialities of Ramayana’ ....... 7305. Tripuraneni Ramaswamy Chowdary’s ‘Murder of Sambuka’ 7386. Muddukrishna’s ‘Asokam’ ..................................................... 7477. Chalam’s ‘Sita’s entry into Fire’ ............................................ 7538. Periyar E.V. Ramaswamy’s ‘Ramayana: A True Reading’ .... 757

Part 4 Comments on ‘The Poisonous Tree’ 770

[Both Positive and Negative]

INDEX ......................................................... 780

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A Note on TranslationThis translation is based on the Telugu original ‘Ramayana

Vishavruksham’ (Ramayana, the Poisonous Tree), which appeared inthree volumes in three consecutive years: 1974, 1975 and 1976. Sincethen all the three volumes have undergone several reprints: the firstvolume seven times, the second one for six times and the third fourtimes. Recently, the writer has revised all the three volumes with aview to publishing them in a single volume. She has made some addi-tions, deletions and alterations to the earlier editions. This translation,therefore, is based on the forthcoming/latest Telugu edition.

A note on this translation is necessary since the source language(Telugu) and the receptor language (English) are ‘genetically’ as wellas ‘culturally’ unrelated and ‘structurally’ different.

The differences in syntax (grammar) and semantics (vocabularyincluding culture-specific words) of these two languages pose certainproblems to the translators.

The grammatical features that pose problems are: articles, prepo-sitions, auxiliaries, tense and aspect, voice, tag questions, conjunctions,word order, sentence length and sentence types.

One specific feature of the original is that it does not contain evena single passive-voice sentence whereas the translation, at some places,is not free from the passive voice.

The problems usually faced in the sphere of vocabulary are: Col-locations, figurative expressions such as irony, idioms, metaphors andproverbs, forms of address, abuses, onomatopoeic words, reduplica-tion words, religious and mythological terms, use of adjectives and ad-verbs, units of measurements and weights, the numbers and numerals,proper names, flora and fauna, birds and animals, and such other cul-ture specific words.

Figurative expressions posed major problem. Wherever we haveequivalents, direct or indirect, in English, we used them. Whenever we

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could not find equivalents, we have resorted to literal translations ofsome peculiar, language-specific expressions, with a view that the con-ceptual world of speakers of different languages overlap at least in cer-tain areas and hence the literally translated source language expres-sions will be comprehensible to a reasonable extent. Yet, in some 'diffi-cult’ situations, we substituted the figurative expressions of the Sourcelanguage by non-figurative expressions of the Receptor language. Inthe case of plant and animal worlds, which frequently appear in theoriginal text, we have introduced the source language names since Bo-tanical and Zoological terminology may not be intelligible to non-spe-cialist readers. In such cases and in the specific cultural contexts wehave reproduced the source language words in italics.

One extremely serious problem that we have faced was translat-ing various elements of Humour: irony, ridicule, sarcasm, and wit, whichthe original text contains in abundance. The loss of these features ofthe original in the translation is obvious to those who read both theTelugu and English versions. Also there has been a considerable ‘loss’when we could not translate the dialect of the illiterate characters.

The English translation of Sanskrit slokas is based on the Telugutranslation as found in the Telugu original. Therefore, readers who haveaccess to English translations of Valmiki's ‘Ramayana’ may find differ-ences in translation, sarga (chapter) numbers and even sloka (poem)numbers. The Telugu original is based on the Telugu translation ofValmiki's Ramayana, which two important traditional scholars publishedin the late 1800s and early 1900s. They are: Mr. Chadaluvada SundaraRama Sastrulu and Mr. Gattupalli Sesha Charyulu.

Four persons (including me) have translated this work. The namesof the translators appear in the inner title page in accordance with thequantity (not necessarily quality) of the work, which they have done.Apart from the inner title page, their names appear also at the end of thestories or links, which they have translated.

Once the translation of an item (a story or link) was over, I com-pared the translation with the Telugu original sentence by sentence and

A Note on Translation

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made modifications wherever I felt necessary, after discussing with thewriter. Our main concern and priority have been not merely repro-ducing the essential meaning of the original text but also the indi-vidual style of the original writer. (By style, we mean the specificmanner in which the writer presents her ideas, intentions, attitudesand so on.) In this process, there might have occurred some changes,which may not retain or present the scholarship and the translation abil-ity of the respective translators fully. However, before beginning thetranslation, they had kindly agreed to tolerate my interference. I justifymy interference with the help of the concept of ‘World Englishes’, whichimply that one can allow the influence of the First or the Source lan-guage substratum including the nature of the style of the writer whiletranslating.

After my comparison and the necessary modifications, I presentedeach draft of the translation of each item to Ms. Meera Marathe,an English language teacher in Hyderabad.

Ms.Meera read the translation of the major portions of the text(parts 1 & 2) with great care and patience and made useful correctionsand suggestions to improve the quality of the translation. I have carriedout those corrections and suggestions after discussing with the writer. Icarried out almost all the grammatical corrections. However, it was notpossible to carry out some corrections concerning the style where thewriter or I felt such corrections might not convey the style of the origi-nal.

Mr. R. Venkateswara Rao, one of the translators, went throughmy translation of parts 3 & 4 and made corrections and suggestions.

Despite useful suggestions of the English language experts, thepresent translation may still have shortcomings due to either my over-sight or my personal choice with regard to the suggestions made. Hence,I am responsible, not the language experts or the other translators, forthe shortcomings that remain.

B.R. Bapuji

A Note on Translation

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“Just as to the bourgeois,the disappearance of class property isthe disappearance of production itself, sothe disappearance of class culture is to himidentical with the disappearance ofall culture. That culture, the loss of whichhe laments, is, for the enormous majority,a mere training to act as a machine.”

“The ruling ideas of each age havebeen the ideas of the ruling class.”

Marx & Engels(‘Manifesto of the Communist Party’)

The Vedantists say, “Know Yourself!”Marxists also say so, “Know Yourself! Know What Your Class is!!” -A Marxist

9Preface

After looking at this book or afterreading a couple of words, virtuous peoplemay feel like striking a match and burningit. If they burn it, it is the pages which willburn not thoughts. Thoughts are born andgrow naturally out of experiences in thecourse of history. It is no use ignoring thisfact.

If the title ‘Ramayana, the poisonoustree’ makes even rationalists hesitant, it isthe fault of the Ramayana not mine. If weunderstand clearly the seed out of whichthis poisonous tree grew and to which poi-sonous snakes it has been giving shelter sofar, it becomes clear how suitable this titleis.

This book is not meant for dogmaticpundits; devotees obsessed withtemples; devotees who wear suits andthose who are gems among the stupidwomen that arrogantly think that chang-ing dresses, wearing make-up and hair-style is ‘progress’. This is meant forthose children — into whose minds self-ishness and dogma have not yet enteredand who keep their minds open to self-evident facts and thoughts without anyfoulness and with awareness; for thoseyoung women and men who are not ac-quainted with any other thoughts or knowl-edge except weekly magazines and ordi-nary novels. It is my hope that this will servethe interests of the majority of the peoplewho have been subjected for generations

to political and economic exploitation andleading degraded, pathetic and oppressivelives without any hope for emancipation.

“Some people consider rejecting allthat is old a progress”—This is one kindof criticism we hear against the new waysof thinking. But this is not an ‘old’ thing. Ithas not become ‘old’. Values and culture,which the Ramayana propagates, are stillreflected in daily life even today. To de-cide that it has not become old, it is enoughto cite any incident that suggests the ‘reci-tation of Rama’s name’ as a solution forthe present-day problems.

Moreover, this attempt does not meanrejecting all that is old. All that is old isalso human history. The objective of thisattempt is to expose the origin and devel-opment of the Ramayana in the course ofthe evolution of history; its nature and con-tent; and the real face of the social set-up,which it propagates daily.

“Many poets have written theRamayana in different ways. Differentstories have been composed based onValmiki’s Ramayana alone. Which do weconsider as the basis?” — this is a ques-tion. Whichever we consider as the ba-sis, all versions have the same aim. We willsee this point in detail as we proceed fur-ther in the preface.

“Did Ramayana really happen or not?If it did, all the persons in it passed awayin the remote past, didn’t they? Then what

PART 1

Preface

10 Ramayana, the Poisonous Tree

is the use in debating about those peoplenow? If it ‘did not happen’, what is theuse in thinking so much about a fictitiousstory?” —These are also very importantquestions. But whether Ramayana didtake place or not, what we are concernedwith is its ‘contents’. It’s all the samewhether Rama was a person who lived inthe past for some time or he is a character,which a poet created.

What becomes evident to us from thisstory is the following:

� Society was already split into richand poor classes.

� Kings like Dasaratha, Rama andRavana ruled their kingdoms despoti-cally in the interests of the rich class asthe representatives of that class. In fact,they themselves possessed lands andwealth.

� Women led a life without indepen-

dence, individuality and in the darkness ofmale domination.

� Ordinary people sank a thousandtimes deep into poverty, caste differ-ences, beggary, prostitution, religiousdogma and the wars between one raceand another and between one class andanother.

� The exploitative literature and cul-ture of the ruling class infected the bonesas well as souls of the population like bac-teria.

Thus, we find in the Ramayana theeconomic, political and social condi-tions, principles and morals of that time.Some of them are still in currency eventoday in the same old form as well aswith some modifications. This is impor-tant for us. Occurrence or non-occur-rence of the Ramayana will not affectthese facts.

The Story of RamaLet us see about the Ramayana in

brief.Millions of people have shown a lot of

devotion and respect for the story of Rama.As soon as they hear the word ‘Rama’,they go into ecstasies and fold their handsin reverence. The reason for this is a lot ofrespect and belief of the people in this char-acter. Is Rama eligible for such belief andreverence? Such a question may appearextremely sinful.

The story which people commonlyknow about the Ramayana is that —Rama’s father did not give Rama the le-gitimate right to rule the kingdom butsent him to the forest. While Rama faced

many hardships along with his wife in theforest, a wicked person abducted Sita,denying peace to Rama even in his life inthe forest. Rama sinks in the sea of sor-row, wages a battle with his valour, killsthat wicked person and gets back his wife;Rama returns to the kingdom, rules overpeople happily but once again the wife andhusband had to separate from one another!Thus, from the beginning to the end of thestory, people feel sorrow! Sorrow! Sor-row! Sorrow! Each person sheds tearsthat flow from his melted heart!

If the story had really happened likethis, it is certainly heart breaking for everyone. But, is this the story of the

11Preface

Ramayana? Is truth this much? Even if wesee it according to Valmiki’s story, doesRama really have a right over his father’skingdom? Was he sent to forest unjustly?Did Rama really spend the life of a sageaway from politics in the forest? Did hereally have respect for his father? Was hereally a valorous person? Did he wage waragainst Ravana, only for the sake of hiswife? Did he, subsequently, rule people sothat they lived in abundance. Among themillions who worship Rama, how manypeople know these kinds of facts andmyths? Did any divine-story teller or ascholar tell these things without concealingfacts? Do they, in fact, know all thesethings?

In fact, the literate among the com-mon people are few. Even among theliterates, those who read epics and my-thologies are still fewer. Anyway, allpeople hear Divine-stories (Harikathas),Folk-stories (Jamukulakathas), folksongs or mythology pundits. Exceptthese mythology pundits, none mighthave read the actual story. Jamukulastory tellers, folk singers and those whotell Harikathas merely learn only thosesongs and stories that have been trans-mitted from one generation to the otherand narrate the same to people and ekeout a living. Even these persons do notknow the actual story.

The only people who know the storyare pundits. But they don’t tell things asthey are. This does not mean thatValmiki wrote very sincerely and pun-dits alone are not telling truth to people.

The story of Ramayana must havebeen in vogue among people even be-

fore Valmiki. That poet turned such storyinto his poetry and slokas. While tellingthe story he presented it with manymyths. However mythically he told thestory, it was imperative on his part tospeak some truths at least on some oc-casions. But these pundits do not allowpeople to know even those truths, whichthe poet mentioned. All these things willbecome clear while we read the storiesin this book.

No story reaches people truthfullyand clearly without any myth or mask.For example, Rama, although the eldestson, did not have the right over the king-dom of his father. The kingdom belongedto Bharata! Because, while marryingKaikeyi, Dasaratha promised that hewould give the kingdom to her son. Thisis what Valmiki, himself wrote. This isso important a fact that the entireRamayana is based on it. The poetpushed such an important fact as a trivialpoint to a corner and mentioned it aftera long while. He mentioned it whileRama was in the forests! The fact cameout only then! Moreover, through themouth of Rama himself! This meansRama too knew this fact right from thebeginning! It would not have beenRama’s fault if he was prepared for coro-nation as he was not aware of Bharata’sright.

Is it not hypocrisy on the part ofRama to be ready for coronation evenafter knowing the fact? Why did the poetwrite as if Rama too knew aboutBharata’s right? The poet could havelead the story as if ‘Rama agreed forcoronation’ because he was unaware of

12 Ramayana, the Poisonous Tree

the fact.Why didn't the poet do so? — Weget many such doubts as these. For somedoubts, we don’t even get answers.

The poet had so crazy a devotion forthe character of Rama that whatever thatcharacter did was right for him. If Ramagot ready for coronation with the fullknowledge that it was Bharata’s rightto be crowned a king, he thinks it is rightbecause it was Rama who got ready forsuch an act! The poet is blinded by hisdevotion that he wonders, “Can we findfault in Lord Rama?’ What care doessuch a poet take in portraying that char-acter? In fact it is not that the poet por-trays the character of Lord Rama, it isthe character of Rama that leads thepoet. The poet unfolds the story by wor-shipping that character. It is the duty ofthe poet to flatter that character. If thatis the case, where is the need for the poetto take care while depicting that char-acter?

When the truth of ‘Bharata’s rightover the kingdom’ is present in the storyitself, concealing it and driving the storyalong another path; attempting to makepeople believe that some injustice hadbeen done to Rama and people believ-ing it to be true — how ridiculous thesethings are! How deceptive these thingsare!

What remains in the story if Ramadoes not have the right over the king-dom? What injustice has been done toRama? Is there any meaning in the lam-entation of people that Rama could notget the kingdom? If Bharata’s right wastrue, Rama’s right would become false.The story of Ramayana itself, its very

greatness would become false.The poet mentioned about Bharata’s

right not because he thought, “Let mespeak the truth without concealing it’.He mentioned it because it was unavoid-able to mention it according to that story.

Suppose a person talks about someissues. While talking, he tries to concealcertain things which he does not wantto tell us. But either due to his negli-gence or stupidity, certain things, whichhe wanted to conceal, will come out inhis own words. He won’t recognize thisfact. Thus those truths which he doesnot tell us willingly will also come out.Those truths will be contradictory towhat he outwardly says. We came toknow these truths only through him andnot that we gathered them from else-where or concocted them. This is whatthe poet has done in many contexts inthe Ramayana. Concealing of truth andglorification of untruth by raising it tothe skies! At every step we find the poetover anxious to conceal things.

The stories in this volume will ap-pear unbelievable because we do notknow the actual facts very clearly.

Some incidents and dialogues ofthese stories are absent in the original.But they are not contrary to the origi-nal. This means, even if I depict a newincident, it has its basis in the original.Characters and their nature too are inaccordance with the original story. Thebasis for dialogues and criticism isValmiki’s original story. Here a questionarises, ‘What, then, is new that this booksays?’ The aim of this book is to make

13Preface

explicit many important issues that areconcealed and try to explain their socialmeaning.

There are mainly four aspects inthese stories: (1) Those, which are nottold, even though the poet ought to havetold them. (2) Those which the poet didnot at all like to tell. (3) Those which hetold but with outrageous distortions.(4) Those which he told very explicitly.Here, let us see a couple of examples foreach point.

1. Those things which are nottold even though the poetought to have toldThe poet, who depicted even cattle

for several pages, did not mention‘Urmila’. Is it not necessary to utter asingle word about this character? If Sitais a devoted wife because she accompa-nied her husband in the forest, Urmila isnot a devoted wife because she did notgo to the forest along with her husband.Hence based on this fact, if I write thatUrmila was uninterested in her husbandand she is not as devoted a wife as Sita,will it be my creation? Is it possible totell this incident, which I have writtenabout, as contrary to the original sinceit is not found in the original?

Another point which the poet did notmention is this: Dasaratha gives Sitasarees that are enough for 14 years, or-naments, perfumes; armaments, shieldsand weapons for his sons; a basket,crow-bar to dig and other implements.All these things were carried up toGuha’s kingdom in a chariot. There,Guha’s servants took them in a boat and

crossed the river Ganga. The poet talkedabout those articles upto that place.Thereafter he has not mentioned them.How did those things move from there?Did they fly? Did servants carry them?How did all this reach the forest? Thepoet did not talk about this. Even if hedid not talk about it, will it amount tobetraying the original if I say who car-ried the entire luggage?

2. Those things which the poetdidn’t like to mentionRama, Lakshmana and Sita occa-

sionally walk along forests and villages.They come across only ‘sages’ and noneelse, why? Aren’t there ordinary peoplein villages? Why not? They must havebeen there. But the poet does not like tomention them. He always would like totell about sages alone! The beauty of theepic poem would not be affected if hehad written that either tribals or wood-cutters were seen in the forest. Yet thepoet did not mention them. I have men-tioned them. Will it be contrary to theoriginal story if I wrote that Rama,Lakshamana and Sita came across somepeasants, wood-cutters, a washerman,a beggar, folk singers and other travel-lers? Is it possible to argue, “No, it can'thappen. It is impossible to come acrosspeople like that?”

The poet simply narrates the utter-ances of the characters but never mentionstheir inner thoughts—except that the youngRama argues with his own inner-self for awhile before killing Tataki. The poet, hereand there, used expressions like “mind,speech and deed”, implying that ‘his

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